IIn September Ron Shaich, CEO of the fast-casual dining chain, tried to live for a week on the average amount allocated to individuals in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, previously known as the Food Stamp program). Living on $31.50 for a week wasn’t easy: “I’ve been eating a lot of carbs and drinking a lot of water,” he said. “I can’t even go into a Panera.”

In July, with six months to go before the Affordable Care Act goes live and at the height of bureaucratic wrangling over the details of implementation, leaders of three major U.S. unions, including the highly-influential Teamsters, wrote a letter to President Obama. It wasn’t pretty — the union bosses said that unless changes were made, the health reform plan could “destroy the foundation of the 40 hour work week that is the backbone of the American middle class”